Press releases September 2011http://press.cern/press-releases/2011/09/l%E2%80%99exp%C3%A9rience-opera-annonce-une-anomalie-dans-le-temps-de-vol-des-neutrinos?created=
CERN press office - press releasesenCERN sets course for extra-low-energy antiprotonshttp://press.cern/press-releases/2011/09/cern-sets-course-extra-low-energy-antiprotons
<span class="submitted-by">28 Sep 2011</span>
<div class="field-body">
<p>Geneva, 28 September 2011. The kick-off meeting for ELENA, the Extra Low Energy Antiproton Ring, starts today at CERN<sup><a href="#footnote1">1</a></sup>. Approved by CERN Council in June this year, ELENA is scheduled to deliver its first antiprotons in 2016. This week’s kick-off meeting brings together scientists from Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, Sweden, the UK and the USA. The project is led by CERN.</p>
<p>“ELENA is a new facility aimed to deliver antiprotons at the lowest energies ever reached in order to improve the study of antimatter,” said CERN’s Stéphan Maury, Head of the ELENA project.</p>
<p>ELENA will consist of a small new decelerator ring that will be installed in same building that houses CERN’s existing Antiproton Decelerator (AD). It will slow antiprotons down to under a fiftieth of the current AD energy, bringing an improvement of a factor of 10-100 in antiproton trapping efficiency. At the AD, antiprotons have to be slowed down by passing them through a series of foils, a process that results in the loss of some 99.9% of the antiprotons extracted from the AD before they reach the experiments.</p>
<p><em>“This is a big step forward for antimatter physics. Going to extra low energy increases the trapping efficiency for antiprotons, which will not only improve the research potential of existing experiments, but will also allow CERN to support a wider range of antimatter experiments,”</em> said Walter Oelert, an antimatter pioneer at CERN, who has actively supported the ELENA project.</p>
<p>Ever since the Nobel Prize winning discovery of antiprotons in 1955, these particles have proved to be an important research tool. In the 1980s, they played a pivotal role in the discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN, which also led to a Nobel Prize.</p>
<p>CERN’s achievements with low-energy antiprotons include the trapping and accumulation of large numbers of antiprotons in the early 1990s, which led to very precise comparisons of protons and antiprotons. In 1995, the first antiatoms - antihydrogen - were created at CERN, opening the way to new experiments on antimatter and, more recently, the trapping of antihydrogen atoms. One experiment at the AD has also made preliminary studies of the potential for using antiprotons in cancer therapy. In the future, experiments will make detailed comparisons of hydrogen and antihydrogen atoms, and measure the influence of gravity on antihydrogen.</p>
<p>Construction of ELENA is scheduled to begin in 2013, in parallel with AD running. When complete in 2016, ELENA will be able to support more experiments than the AD can today, giving CERN - a laboratory best known for the high-energy frontier of particle physics - a grandstand seat at the low-energy frontier.</p>
</div>
<h3 class="field-label">
Footnote(s) </h3>
<div class="field-footnote footnote-item">
<p>CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's leading laboratory for particle physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Romania is a candidate for accession. Israel is an Associate Member in the pre-stage to Membership. India, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and UNESCO have Observer status.</p>
</div>
Wed, 28 Sep 2011 09:00:00 +0000Cian O'Luanaigh70 at http://press.cernOPERA experiment reports anomaly in flight time of neutrinos from CERN to Gran Sassohttp://press.cern/press-releases/2011/09/opera-experiment-reports-anomaly-flight-time-neutrinos-cern-gran-sasso
<span class="submitted-by">23 Sep 2011</span>
<div class="field-body">
<h4><strong>UPDATE 8 June 2012</strong></h4>
<h3>Neutrinos sent from CERN to Gran Sasso respect the cosmic speed limit</h3>
<p>At the 25th International Conference on Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics in Kyoto today, CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci presented results on the time of flight of neutrinos from CERN to the INFN Gran Sasso Laboratory on behalf of four experiments situated at Gran Sasso. The four, Borexino, ICARUS, LVD and OPERA all measure a neutrino time of flight consistent with the speed of light. This is at odds with a measurement that the OPERA collaboration put up for scrutiny last September, indicating that the original OPERA measurement can be attributed to a faulty element of the experiment’s fibre optic timing system.</p>
<p>“Although this result isn’t as exciting as some would have liked,” said Bertolucci, “it is what we all expected deep down. The story captured the public imagination, and has given people the opportunity to see the scientific method in action – an unexpected result was put up for scrutiny, thoroughly investigated and resolved in part thanks to collaboration between normally competing experiments. That’s how science moves forward.”</p>
<p>In another development reported in Kyoto, the OPERA experiment showed evidence for the appearance of a second tau-neutrino in the CERN muon-neutrino beam, this is an important step towards understanding the science of neutrino oscillations.</p>
<h4><strong>UPDATE 16 March 2012</strong></h4>
<h3>ICARUS experiment at Gran Sasso laboratory reports new measurement of neutrino time of flight consistent with the speed of light</h3>
<p>The ICARUS experiment at the Italian Gran Sasso laboratory has today reported a new measurement of the time of flight of neutrinos from CERN to Gran Sasso. The ICARUS measurement, using last year’s short pulsed beam from CERN, indicates that the neutrinos do not exceed the speed of light on their journey between the two laboratories. This is at odds with the initial measurement reported by OPERA last September.</p>
<p>"The evidence is beginning to point towards the OPERA result being an artefact of the measurement," said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci, "but it's important to be rigorous, and the Gran Sasso experiments, BOREXINO, ICARUS, LVD and OPERA will be making new measurements with pulsed beams from CERN in May to give us the final verdict. In addition, cross-checks are underway at Gran Sasso to compare the timings of cosmic ray particles between the two experiments, OPERA and LVD. Whatever the result, the OPERA experiment has behaved with perfect scientific integrity in opening their measurement to broad scrutiny, and inviting independent measurements. This is how science works."</p>
<p>The ICARUS experiment has independent timing from OPERA and measured seven neutrinos in the beam from CERN last year. These all arrived in a time consistent with the speed of light.</p>
<p>"The ICARUS experiment has provided an important cross check of the anomalous result reports from OPERA last year," said Carlo Rubbia, Nobel Prize winner and spokesperson of the ICARUS experiment. "ICARUS measures the neutrino's velocity to be no faster than the speed of light. These are difficult and sensitive measurements to make and they underline the importance of the scientific process. The ICARUS Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber is a novel detector which allows an accurate reconstruction of the neutrino interactions comparable with the old bubble chambers with fully electronics acquisition systems. The fast associated scintillation pulse provides the precise timing of each event, and has been exploited for the neutrino time-of-flight measurement. This technique is now recognized world wide as the most appropriate for future large volume neutrino detectors”.</p>
<p><a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/1203.3433">http://arxiv.org/abs/1203.3433</a></p>
<h4><strong>UPDATE 23 February 2012</strong></h4>
<p>The OPERA collaboration has informed its funding agencies and host laboratories that it has identified two possible effects that could have an influence on its neutrino timing measurement. These both require further tests with a short pulsed beam. If confirmed, one would increase the size of the measured effect, the other would diminish it. The first possible effect concerns an oscillator used to provide the time stamps for GPS synchronizations. It could have led to an overestimate of the neutrino's time of flight. The second concerns the optical fibre connector that brings the external GPS signal to the OPERA master clock, which may not have been functioning correctly when the measurements were taken. If this is the case, it could have led to an underestimate of the time of flight of the neutrinos. The potential extent of these two effects is being studied by the OPERA collaboration. New measurements with short pulsed beams are scheduled for May.</p>
<h4><strong>UPDATE 18 November 2011</strong></h4>
<p>Following the OPERA collaboration's presentation at CERN on 23 September, inviting scrutiny of their neutrino time-of-flight measurement from the broader particle physics community, the collaboration has rechecked many aspects of its analysis and taken into account valuable suggestions from a wide range of sources. One key test was to repeat the measurement with very short beam pulses from CERN. This allowed the extraction time of the protons, that ultimately lead to the neutrino beam, to be measured more precisely.</p>
<p>The beam sent from CERN consisted of pulses three nanoseconds long separated by up to 524 nanoseconds. Some 20 clean neutrino events were measured at the Gran Sasso Laboratory, and precisely associated with the pulse leaving CERN. This test confirms the accuracy of OPERA's timing measurement, ruling out one potential source of systematic error. The new measurements do not change the initial conclusion. Nevertheless, the observed anomaly in the neutrinos' time of flight from CERN to Gran Sasso still needs further scrutiny and independent measurement before it can be refuted or confirmed.</p>
<p>On 17 November, the collaboration submitted a paper on this measurement to the peer reviewed Journal of High Energy Physics (JHEP). This paper is also available on the <a href="http://inspirehep.net/record/928153/files/">Inspire website</a>.</p>
<h4><strong>ORIGINAL PRESS RELEASE</strong></h4>
<p>Geneva, 23 September 2011. The OPERA<a href="#footnote1"><sup>1</sup></a> experiment, which observes a neutrino beam from CERN<a href="#footnote2"><sup>2</sup></a> 730 km away at Italy’s INFN Gran Sasso Laboratory, will present new results in a seminar at CERN this afternoon at 16:00 CEST. The seminar will be webcast at <a href="http://webcast.cern.ch">http://webcast.cern.ch</a>. Journalists wishing to ask questions may do so via twitter using the hash tag #nuquestions, or via the usual CERN press office channels.</p>
<p>The OPERA result is based on the observation of over 15000 neutrino events measured at Gran Sasso, and appears to indicate that the neutrinos travel at a velocity 20 parts per million above the speed of light, nature’s cosmic speed limit. Given the potential far-reaching consequences of such a result, independent measurements are needed before the effect can either be refuted or firmly established. This is why the OPERA collaboration has decided to open the result to broader scrutiny. The collaboration’s result is available on the preprint server arxiv.org: <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/1109.4897">http://arxiv.org/abs/1109.4897</a>.</p>
<p>The OPERA measurement is at odds with well-established laws of nature, though science frequently progresses by overthrowing the established paradigms. For this reason, many searches have been made for deviations from Einstein’s theory of relativity, so far not finding any such evidence. The strong constraints arising from these observations makes an interpretation of the OPERA measurement in terms of modification of Einstein’s theory unlikely, and give further strong reason to seek new independent measurements.</p>
<p><em>“This result comes as a complete surprise,”</em> said OPERA spokesperson, Antonio Ereditato of the University of Bern. <em>“After many months of studies and cross checks we have not found any instrumental effect that could explain the result of the measurement.</em> <em>While OPERA researchers will continue their studies, we are also looking forward to independent measurements to fully assess the nature of this observation.”</em></p>
<p><em> “When an experiment finds an apparently unbelievable result and can find no artefact of the measurement to account for it, it’s normal procedure to invite broader scrutiny, and this is exactly what the OPERA collaboration is doing, it’s good scientific practice,”</em> said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci. <em>“If this measurement is confirmed, it might change our view of physics, but we need to be sure that there are no other, more mundane, explanations. That will require independent measurements.”</em></p>
<p>In order to perform this study, the OPERA Collaboration teamed up with experts in metrology from CERN and other institutions to perform a series of high precision measurements of the distance between the source and the detector, and of the neutrinos’ time of flight. The distance between the origin of the neutrino beam and OPERA was measured with an uncertainty of 20 cm over the 730 km travel path. The neutrinos’ time of flight was determined with an accuracy of less than 10 nanoseconds by using sophisticated instruments including advanced GPS systems and atomic clocks. The time response of all elements of the CNGS beam line and of the OPERA detector has also been measured with great precision.</p>
<p><em>"We have established synchronization between CERN and Gran Sasso that gives us nanosecond accuracy, and we’ve measured the distance between the two sites to 20 centimetres,” </em>said Dario Autiero, the CNRS researcher who will give this afternoon’s seminar.<em> “Although our measurements have low systematic uncertainty and high statistical accuracy, and we place great confidence in our results, we’re looking forward to comparing them with those from other experiments."</em></p>
<p><em>“The potential impact on science is too large to draw immediate conclusions or attempt physics interpretations. </em><em>My first reaction is that the neutrino is still surprising us with its mysteries.</em><em>”</em> said Ereditato. “<em>Today’s seminar is intended to invite scrutiny from the broader particle physics community.”</em></p>
<p>The OPERA experiment was inaugurated in 2006, with the main goal of studying the rare transformation (oscillation) of muon neutrinos into tau neutrinos. One first such event was observed in 2010, proving the unique ability of the experiment in the detection of the elusive signal of tau neutrinos.</p>
<h3>Further information:</h3>
<ul><li><a href="http://operaweb.lngs.infn.it/">OPERA website</a></li>
<li>Quantum diaries blog post: <a href="http://www.quantumdiaries.org/2011/09/23/elementary-my-dear-neutrino/"><em>Elementary, my dear neutrino...</em></a></li>
<li>Photos from the OPERA collaboration:
<ul><li><a href="http://www.infn.it/comunicazione/scambio/">http://www.infn.it/comunicazione/scambio/</a></li>
<li><a href="http://phototheque.cnrs.fr/to.php?sessionId=506710**20110923.090626&amp;obj=bngb}pkrmnzkxphogiueihnmuyfrnhzfshrhtpgbuocefom}iqhdtgjvzv">CNRS</a></li>
<li><a href="http://cdsweb.cern.ch/record/1384483">Photos of the seminar on OPERA Results</a></li>
</ul></li>
</ul> </div>
<h3 class="field-label">
Footnote(s) </h3>
<div class="field-footnote footnote-item">
<p>1. OPERA has been designed and is being conducted by a team of researchers from Belgium, Croatia, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Russia, Switzerland and Turkey. The experiment constitutes a complex scientific enterprise that has been realised thanks to the skill of a large number of scientists, engineers, technicians and students, and with the strong commitment of the various actors of the project. In particular we mention the LNGS/INFN and CERN laboratories, and the major financial support of Italy and Japan with substantial contributions from Belgium, France, Germany and Switzerland. The OPERA Collaboration presently includes about 160 researchers from 30 institutions and 11 countries: IIHE-ULB Brussels, Belgium; IRB Zagreb, Croatia; LAPP Annecy, France; IPNL Lyon, France; IPHC Strasbourg, France; Hamburg, Germany; Technion Haifa, Israel; Bari, Italy; Bologna, Italy; LNF, Italy, L’Aquila, Italy; LNGS, Italy; Naples, Italy; Padova, Italy; Rome, Italy; Salerno, Italy; Ai</p>
</div>
<div class="field-footnote footnote-item">
<p>2. CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's leading laboratory for particle physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Romania is a candidate for accession. India, Israel, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and UNESCO have Observer status.</p>
</div>
Fri, 23 Sep 2011 09:00:00 +0000Cian O'Luanaigh72 at http://press.cernIsrael to become Associate Member State of CERNhttp://press.cern/press-releases/2011/09/israel-become-associate-member-state-cern
<span class="submitted-by">16 Sep 2011</span>
<div class="field-image">
<a href="http://press.cern/sites/press.web.cern.ch/files/image/press/old/110916_israel.jpg"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="http://press.cern/sites/press.web.cern.ch/files/image/press/old/110916_israel.jpg" width="440" height="293" alt="" /></a> </div>
<div class="field-image-caption">
<p>CERN Director General Rolf Heuer, Israeli Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations Office and other International Organizations in Geneva, H.E. Mr. Aharon Leshno-Yaar and CERN Council president Michel Spiro shake hands</p>
</div>
<div class="field-body">
<p>Geneva 16 September 2011. CERN<a href="#footnote1"><sup>1</sup></a> Director General Rolf Heuer and Israeli Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations Office and other International Organizations in Geneva, H.E. Mr. Aharon Leshno-Yaar today signed a document admitting Israel to CERN Associate Membership, subject to ratification by the Knesset. Following ratification, Israel will become an Associate Member of CERN for a minimum period of 24 months. Following this period, CERN Council will decide on the admission of Israel to full Membership, taking into account the recommendations of a task force to be appointed for this purpose. Israel has a long-standing relationship with CERN, and has been an Observer at the CERN Council since 1991.</p>
<p><em>“It is a vital part of our mission to build bridges between nations. This agreement enriches us scientifically, and is an important step in that direction,” </em>said CERN Director General Rolf Heuer. <em>“I am very pleased that CERN’s relationship with Israel is moving to a higher level.”</em></p>
<p><em>“I am very happy with this decision,” </em>said Eliezer Rabinovici, Professor and Director of the Institute for Advanced Study at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Israel’s scientific observer to Council.<em> “I view it as recognition of the Israeli contributions, both scientific and technological to CERN over the years. The Israeli scientific community is looking forward to the continuation of this joint adventure.”</em></p>
<p>Israel has a strong tradition in both experimental and theoretical particle physics, with a major involvement in the OPAL experiment at CERN’s flagship accelerator through the 1990s, the Large Electron Positron collider. Israel’s accession to Observer status in 1991 followed an agreement to contribute funds to the CERN budget to support Israeli scientists, as well as providing equipment to CERN. The Israeli fund also contributed to LEP running, supported LHC construction and R&amp;D for future accelerators. During its association with CERN, Israel has also supported Palestinian students at CERN, notably sending mixed Israeli-Palestinian contingents to CERN’s summer student programme.</p>
<p>In 2009, Israel was accepted as a special Observer State, with the right to attend restricted Council sessions for discussions of LHC matters. Israel currently has a strong involvement in the ATLAS experiment, and participates in a number of other experiments at CERN.</p>
</div>
<h3 class="field-label">
Footnote(s) </h3>
<div class="field-footnote footnote-item">
<p>CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's leading laboratory for particle physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Romania is a candidate for accession. Israel is an Associate Member in the pre-stage to Membership. India, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and UNESCO have Observer status.</p>
</div>
Fri, 16 Sep 2011 09:00:00 +0000Cian O'Luanaigh74 at http://press.cernCERN announces the Collide@CERN artists' residency programmehttp://press.cern/press-releases/2011/09/cern-announces-collidecern-artists-residency-programme
<span class="submitted-by">02 Sep 2011</span>
<div class="field-image">
<a href="http://press.cern/sites/press.web.cern.ch/files/image/press/old/1109_ars.jpg"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="http://press.cern/sites/press.web.cern.ch/files/image/press/old/1109_ars.jpg" width="500" height="335" alt="" /></a> </div>
<div class="field-image-caption">
<p>The Ars Electronica centre. Image: Nicolas Ferrando, Lois Lammerhuber</p>
</div>
<div class="field-body">
<p>Geneva, 2 September 2011. A new kind of collision will soon be taking place at CERN<a href="#footnote1"><sup>1</sup></a>’s Geneva laboratory. The Collide @ CERN artists’ residency programme means that, as well as colliding particles, CERN will be bringing scientific and artistic creativity into contact. The programme was announced today at the Ars Electronica festival in Linz, Austria.</p>
<p>Collide @ CERN is an important strand of CERN’s policy for engagement with the arts, Great Arts for Great Science, <a href="PR12.11E.html">announced in August</a>. Collide @ CERN is an international competition that will run for a period of three years. Each year, artists working in different art forms will have the opportunity to take up a funded residency of up to three months. The programme is being made possible thanks to generous funding, to date from: Ars Electronica for the Digital Arts Prize (prize money); private individual donors (for the creative process grant/residency); and from the City and the Canton of Geneva for dance and performance (respectively for the prize money and creative process grant/residency). UNIQA Assurances SA Switzerland is the exclusive sponsor of all artists’ insurances for the Collide @ CERN programme.</p>
<p><em>“Science underpins much of modern society and has an influence on the everyday lives of all of us,”</em> said CERN Director General, Rolf Heuer. <em>“As such, it’s important for scientific organizations like CERN to engage with society on many levels, and for us, Collide @ CERN is an important element of that engagement.”</em></p>
<p>The first strand of Collide @ CERN was announced in partnership with Ars Electronica, one of the world’s leading digital arts organizations and CERN’s official cultural partner. Artists are invited to apply for the Prix Electronica Collide @ CERN prize for Digital Arts. The prize consists of a two-part residency. Two months will be spent at CERN, where the winning artist will team up with a scientist as inspirational partner; then one month will be spent at Ars Electronica, where the artist will develop work inspired by the time spent at CERN. Finally, the work will be showcased both at CERN and at the next Ars Electronica Festival, where the next application round for the Digital Arts prize will also be announced<strong>.</strong></p>
<p>The second strand of Collide @ CERN, covering the disciplines of dance and performance, will be unveiled in November. This strand has been made possible thanks to the generous support of both the City and Canton of Geneva.</p>
<p><em>“The arts touch the parts that science alone cannot reach, and vice versa,” </em>said Ariane Koek, CERN's cultural specialist. <em>“Collide @ CERN gives CERN, artists and scientists the opportunity to engage in creative collisions that can occur when these two areas of human creativity and ingenuity come together.”</em></p>
<p>Some of the world’s leading artists have agreed to be creative patrons of the Collide @ CERN artists’ residency programme. They include Swiss architect Jacques Herzog, German visual artist Andreas Gursky, Japanese video artist Mariko Mori, Dutch photographer Frans Lanting, British musician Brian Eno and British sculptor Antony Gormley, who recently donated a sculpture to the laboratory.</p>
<p><em>“We are extremely grateful to our external funders, cultural partners and patrons who are making this latest CERN experiment possible,” </em>said Koek<em>. “Without them it could not happen.”</em></p>
<h3>Further information:</h3>
<ul><li>Collide @ CERN: <a href="http://www.cern.ch/arts/collide/">http://www.cern.ch/arts/collide/</a></li>
<li>Ars Electronica: <a href="http://www.aec.at/collide">http://www.aec.at/collide</a></li>
<li>Online entry for the Prix Arts Electronica Collide @ CERN prize will be available from 15 September 2011 on the Ars Electronica website.</li>
</ul> </div>
<h3 class="field-label">
Footnote(s) </h3>
<div class="field-footnote footnote-item">
<p>CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's leading laboratory for particle physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Romania is a candidate for accession. Israel is an Associate Member in the pre-stage to Membership. India, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and UNESCO have Observer status.</p>
</div>
Fri, 02 Sep 2011 09:00:00 +0000Cian O'Luanaigh76 at http://press.cern